Read Job 38:1-11, The Authority of the Bible (8)

Before we move to another subject I want to mention one other issue with archaeology and that’s the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls.  Up until the discovery of these scrolls the oldest manuscript of the Old Testament dated around 925 AD.  The scrolls, discovered over several years beginning in 1947, provided manuscripts that dated to between 200 BC and 100AD.  The assumption was that these scrolls were going to show that the Bible, being so distant from the original writings, was going to be shown to be unreliable.  But amazingly, the Dead Sea Scrolls proved the reliability of the Bible.  Thus they gave a strong confirmation of the authority of the Bible.

Contrast this with the story of the Book of Mormon.  The story is that Joseph Smith translated it from gold plates, in private, and that the plates were returned to the Angel Moroni.  What this means is that there was one translation and can never be another because there are no manuscripts, no gold plates.  Further we are told the writing on the plates was in “reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics”.  I am not sure what that meant and neither was anyone else.  Archaeology has never heard of such a thing.  There simply is no consistency between Mormonism and archaeology.

i)      Consistent with true science.

Again, we are raising a huge topic.  Again, we will briefly call attention to some thoughts.  First, when we say true science we are referring to the scientific method.  For example, evolution is a theory in my view.  I believe in a Creator, based on my trust in God’s word.  Someone may hold to evolution but it will be a faith proposition, not a scientifically proven fact.  The same can be said about anthropology and whether humanity began from one person/couple or multiple people. 

Second, archaeology is, of course, a science.  We have already singled that out because of its great relevance to books that tell ancient stories and treats them as concrete events.  Another area of science that has developed in modern times is genetics.  The Bible speaks often of generations and is to a great extent the history of a particular family, the descendents of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  Science has sought to identify various markers unique to certain people groups, a system that could be used to confirm or deny important aspects of the stories.  The Bible is on record in identifying the families of the earth, especially in Gen. 10 after the flood.  Genetics has confirmed, for example, the modern-day Canaanites as found in Lebanon.  The various Semitic groups (e.g. Arabs and Jews) are identified as consistent with the Bible’s description of their common origin.  On the other hand, genetics denies the narrative of the Book of Mormon.  The narrative there is of three people groups, two of which are descended from Israel, including American Indians.  But genetics is clear that Native Americans have roots in Asia, not in Israel.

A third area to think about has to do with the Bible’s consistency in terms of explanation of things like the origin of the universe and the world wide flood event of Gen. 6-9.  The Bible is not a scientific book but it does speak consistently about these things.  In contrast the Book of Mormon seems quite confusing on such issues.  For example, Jesus is said to be the Creator of all things; yet His Father lived on earth as a mortal. 

Authority demands truth.  Science goes a long way to confirm the Bible as true.  It does not disprove the Bible as is the case with the Book of Mormon.  We do not rest in the fact that “science is on our side.”  We rest in the Lord our God and the fact that He has revealed Himself in the Bible.  The result of that trust is that the Bible is true and thus it will always be at peace with true science.